


The Sunshine After a Storm

by opulenceuearneverything



Category: No Fandom
Genre: Angst with a Happy Ending, F/F, butnotreally, itkindahurts, sorry - Freeform
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-12-29
Updated: 2020-12-29
Packaged: 2021-03-10 20:55:04
Rating: Not Rated
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,474
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/28403586
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/opulenceuearneverything/pseuds/opulenceuearneverything
Summary: this was just gonna be a random drabble that i thought about while in the shower then started writing while listening to the beetles but it turned out a bit longer lmao.playlist: all of folklore pretty much





	The Sunshine After a Storm

**Author's Note:**

> this was just gonna be a random drabble that i thought about while in the shower then started writing while listening to the beetles but it turned out a bit longer lmao.  
> playlist: all of folklore pretty much

She still remembers the feeling of her skin on her fingertips. The scrape of her chapped lips against her own. The smell of the city on her after a long ride. How her mouth tasted after a smoke. The annoyed noise she would make in the morning when the kettle would whistle before she got her milk and sugar out. And definitely the way she would shove her cold feet onto her warm calves when she got into their bed. Or the way she would shiver close to her after a bad nightmare, almost as if she was a leaf clinging onto a branch.

But that won’t happen again. Charlotte still couldn’t comprehend it. Even after almost 7 months she still comes home thinking she would hear a “Char is that you?” as soon as the door opened. But it won’t because Grace is gone.

She’d gotten too used to living a perfectly content life. But perfect doesn’t last forever. At least not for Charlotte. Everyone else seemed to be living their lives happily but not her. Her heart was too heavy to even get out of bed some days. It hurts too bad to do anything about it. 

She missed her more than one would think is humanly possible. She didn’t believe it would ever be possible for her to live or love ever again. Twenty-seven years old and she already felt like one of the old, weary, lonely lovers in the nursing home two blocks away.

It happened so fast. It had started as any other day would. But about halfway through her workday, the new intern knocked on her door. She remembered when this had happened before but that time it didn’t carry bad news, only Grace screaming into the telephone at work that she found a flat. They had been looking for one since they graduated, but after three months of staying at various friend's houses, they finally found their own home. 

But the call was not that joyful this time around.

So instead of going to lunch as she would on a normal day, she ended up at the hospital. She felt frozen and numb the moment she stepped into room 173 in the critical injuries ward. And there she was. 

Her beautiful Grace. The girl she had fallen in love with when they were just in their sixth year, now a woman in a hospital bed looking broken beyond words. It had been an accident involving a drunk driver and of course, Grace was on her motorcycle. The same motorcycle that got them into fights for weeks because Charlotte knew no good would come out of it. But there was no one to turn to and say ‘I told you so” anymore. 

The doctors talked to Charlotte but she knew through their kind words they were just saying ‘There is no point in trying to get her back’. Charlotte knew that of course but what's the hurt in trying. She realizes in the future that it may have been better to just not try but she felt selfish giving up. She had to try for her Grace.

So she continued going to the hospital every day, talking to Grace as if she’d respond. Reading to her as she used to when they were just silly teenagers. Sitting next to her looking at the ring she had hoped to give her just the next weekend. But she never got a response. Not even a twitch of a finger.

So after two months of trying to reach Grace, she made the decision to let her go. She held her hand, feeling the pulse she knew would not be there soon. The skin she loved so much she would soon never touch again. 

They had taken off all the braces from her body because what good would they do when she wouldn’t be there much longer. She drank in the body of the woman she loved so much. Her perfect collarbones, pointy shoulders, long fingers, and bony wrists. The body she knew how to make writhe from her touch. The body she knew how to take care of when it was sick. The body she would hold every night since they were 19.

She stroked her gaunt cheek one last time as it happened. 

What does one do when they lose their lover. She thought it wouldn’t be so bad because she thought she was prepared. But no one can be prepared for that kind of pain. It's more intense than even realizing you're in love.

As she stood outside the hospital worked herself up to go home. She had obviously been there in the past two months but it would feel different now that she was actually gone. So she went to the tube, as if it was a normal day after work, trying to not break down as she made her way home.

Their home. The home they both adored so much that was littered with empty mugs, polaroids, records, paintings, and even the odd-sock here and there. It was bright yet so cozy that they could just spend days locked up in the space keeping company to the hanging plants and Beetles records. 

But this wasn’t their home anymore. Just Charlotte’s. So she spends the next seven months in depression only leaving the house for groceries or when forced out of the house by her concerned friends.

None of them knew how to help though. None of them know how it feels to lose their true love. Their last breath, the person they would literally take a bullet to the chest too. They loved Grace too but no one could love her as Charlotte does. Or did as she has to constantly mentally correct herself. 

Eventually, it became a year since it happened. It sure doesn’t feel like it because Charlotte still remembers everything that happened that day, even if she wanted to block it from memory. She doesn’t think she’ll ever feel the light Grace shed on her ever again.

But then she comes. A friend's friend who somehow pushed her way into Charlotte’s life. Flora is adamant about becoming friends even after Charlotte had tried to push her away. But luckily Flora is stubborn, so she eventually felt too tired to stop it from happening. 

And then one night they’re on her porch having a smoke when she turns and looks at Charlotte. But what's different from the other times they’ve done this is she feels something she hasn’t felt in a long time. Not since Grace. 

She hasn’t talked to anyone about it, everyone treating her like a fragile thing that could break at any moment. But she supposes she is. But when Flora says “Tell me about her” it all comes spilling out. 

The way it felt falling in love with her. The way it felt actually confessing her feelings. The joy from learning the feeling was reciprocated. The adventure of trying to navigate the world together.

Even the small memories. Like how she would always leave empty mugs on the coffee table or how she always used the butter knife in the jam jar even though she knew it drove Charlotte up the wall.

She told her how it felt to explore one another. Mentally and physically. She told her about how she hated her bony arms, but Charlotte could spend hours praising them. She told her about the stick and poke tattoo on her underarm she had gotten when they were 17 of Charlotte's favorite flower.

How she would always scream when she jumped in the shower even though she always knew Charlotte took boiling hot showers. She told her how she would constantly clean every record they owned, and how she would dance around the living room to make Charlotte cheer up after a bad day at work. How she would always complain about how she over-sweetened her tea, even though they both well knew she loved it that way. She told her about her habit of wearing mismatched socks and how she lost every single piece of jewelry she owned. 

As she finishes with tears running down her face Flora smiles at her. She cups her cheeks and wipes her tears and gives her the private smile she's grown to silently adore. Charlotte stutters trying to say something to just try to make sense of what's happening- but Flora just puts her finger to her lips and says “I know.” 

So Charlotte accepts it. Flora makes her like she’s stepped into the sun after being under an umbrella after a nasty storm. She makes her feel new and understood. Charlotte knows what these feelings mean, and after the guilt of falling so quickly, she remembers.

Grace would want her to be happy.

So she decides maybe she’ll let herself fall.


End file.
